Once could be ignored as sloppiness. But he wrote: "One advantage startups have over established companies is that there are no discrimination laws about starti

Once could be ignored as sloppiness. But he wrote: "One advantage startups have over established companies is that there are no discrimination laws about starting businesses. For example, I would be reluctant to start a startup with a woman who had small children, or was likely to have them soon. But you're not allowed to ask prospective employees if they plan to have kids soon. [...] Whereas when you're starting a company, you can discriminate on any basis you want about who you start it with." (http://www.paulgraham.com/start.html http://www.paulgraham.com/start.html) Or he says: "I see a couple of guys walking down the street and I think, oh, they look like they'd make good founders or bad founders, right, as the case may be. [...] The right kind of nerdy. Like, these guys in this room are not suits, but they're not schlubs either. These are fierce nerds. You have to be somewhat intimidating looking, and that's what these guys are. [...] Yeah, yeah. They're like the kind of people Julius Caesar was afraid of." (http://www.wbur.org/npr/155005546/failure-the-f-word-silicon-valley-loves-and-hates http://www.wbur.org/npr/155005546/failure-the-f-word-silicon...) Or that hilarious cherry-picked stat YC came up with: "at least one female founder." (http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-switch/wp/2014/03/04/y-combinators-lady-problems-in-three-charts/ http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-switch/wp/2014/03/04...) If YC people can't see this, that doesn't bode well for their self-critical thinking skills. (But at least Paul Graham's fairly open about what he thinks, and looks good compared to HN posters.)